Dr. Maria Montessori

"We cannot know the consequences of suppressing a child's spontaneity when he is just beginning to be active. We may even suffocate life itself. That humanity which is revealed in its entire intellectual splendor during the sweet and tender age of childhood should be respected with a kind of religious veneration. It is like the Sun which appears at dawn one flower just beginning to bloom. Education cannot be effective unless it helps a child to open up himself to life."

Dr. Maria Montessori

Maria Montessori was an Italian doctor who worked among the socially and intellectually handicapped children in Rome at the start of 20th century (Kramer 1988, p.1-418). From close observation of the children in her Children's House (the name she gave to her nursery schools), she concluded that children pass through sensitive periods of development when certain skills and competencies are learned more easily....
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